Madden 2013 Wiki Guide

Football 101

The flow of a football game is, of course, an important thing to understand. Even modest football fans have a basic understanding of how NFL games operate, but here's a brief reminder in case you might have forgotten.

NFL games are made up of four 15-minute quarters for a 60-minute game. Each 30 minutes (or two quarters) is a "half," and in between halves is halftime, where players rest, get advice (or yelled at, when needed), and get their heads together and their strategies in line for the upcoming half. The clock, 15 minutes per quarter as mentioned, will generally run even when the ball is dead, except under certain circumstances, such as a first down, an incomplete pass, a run out of bounds, or in the case of injury.

A coin flip with officials and team captains present will give one team the power in the beginning of the game to declare themselves the kicking or receiving team. For what it's worth, we recommend kicking whenever you can in the first half. You never know if you'll desperately need some offense come the second half, and if you kicked in the first half, you are guaranteed to receive in the second. (For purists, this is different from the actual rules where the winning team can defer their choice. In Madden, whoever kicks off the first half will kick off the second, always.)

To start the game, both teams' Special Team units will come on. The kicking team will have their kicker (almost always the same person who will kick point-after tries (PATs) and field goals, though some teams have two kickers) kick the ball to the other team, where special team specialists on the offense will try to do what they can with it.

Hereafter, the basic offensive and defensive units for the teams take the field and the traditional four down cycle of American football begins. Teams always start out (unless a penalty is called) with what is called "1st and 10," or more simply, the first of four downs with ten yards to go. Football games consist of 100 yard fields diverging on a "50 yard line" where the numbers count down to 40, 30, and so on going in both directions (hence there is never a "100 yard line.") Using a variety of passing and running plays, the offense attempts to continue to climb up-field and get first downs to secure a few more plays to reach that same goal. Ultimately, they want a touchdown (worth 6 points, plus a PAT, almost always made, which is worth an extra 1 point), but getting into field goal range (which for most kickers starts at about the 30- or 35-yard line) is also desirable, a field goal being worth 3 points if made.

The defense, on the other hand, runs coverage plays and often blitzes (or rushes the quarterback) in order to keep the offense stationary, or better yet, make them lose yards. If a 1st down isn't achieved via yardage gains (keeping in mind that teams can gain or lose yards with penalties) and 4th down is reached, this almost always means the offensive team will punt the ball and the team once playing defense will now play offense, and vice-versa. Of course, there are several exceptions to the rule, the most notable being if the offensive team is in field goal position, they will usually attempt a field goal instead of punting to try to net some points.

Another exception is in "4th and 1" opportunities, or desperation acts. 4th and 1 opportunities are usually very appealing to teams, especially if they are near midfield and have little to lose, or as mentioned earlier are desperate for offense. If this is the case, they may attempt to get the needed yardage on 4th down to recycle and get back to 1st down. However, if a team fails a 4th down attempt without achieving the 1st down (except in the common case of punting), they turnover the ball at the exact spot they had it downed on the 4th down, which can be detrimental or even devastating when a team could have just punted and put more of a distance between the opposing team and their end zone.

The team with the most points at the end of the four 15-minute quarters wins the game. Since there are only four ways to score in football (touchdown [6 points], PAT [1 point], field goal [3 points], and the never-mentioned safety [2 points - a safety is simply sacking the opposing team's quarterback or another player in possession of the ball in their own end zone... also, 2 points can be achieved in place of the 1 point PAT, called a "two point conversion"]), teams usually plan strategies based on what they need. Almost always, in a close game, whatever points you can get you will take. In other cases, field goal attempts will be replaced with more desperate actions, like a last minute touchdown attempt or replacing a sure 1-point PAT with a more questionable play call on a 2-point conversion.

In regular season play, if the teams are tied at the end of four quarters, they go into a fifth quarter, so to speak, called overtime. Overtime is 15 minutes long, and the first team that scores wins automatically. Since that is the case, teams play a different brand of football in overtime where field goal attempts are more desirable. If the overtime ends with no one scoring, the game ends in an ultra-rare NFL tie. In the playoffs, however, overtimes must be played consecutively until one team wins.